The White Nuns: Cistercian Abbeys for Women in Medieval France 0.0

[*Vita sancti Bernardi*](https://isidore.co/calibre/#panel=book_details&book_id=8913) ch. 8 (p. 36, PDF p. 44): > Some of those who had come with Bernard were married men, whose wives had decided to take the vows of religion at the same time as their husbands [who (all?) went to Molesmes monastery]. As a result of Bernard’s considerate concern for them a convent was built for these good women. It was called [Jully[-les-Nonnains]](https://arts.st-andrews.ac.uk/monasticmatrix/monasticon/jully-les-nonnains) [[Bl. Humbelina](https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/humbeline-bl), St. Bernard's married sister, entered it in 1133.], near Langres, and with God’s help it increased in numbers and holiness, so that even to this day its reputation for a true spirit of dedication and religious life is famous. Not only have its numbers grown, but also its property; so much so, in fact, that other houses have sprung from it, and its fruitfulness in all respects shows no indication of waning. cf. Constance H. Berman, “[Were There Twelfth-Century Cistercian Nuns?](https://isidore.co/misc/Physics%20papers%20and%20books/Zotero/storage/3WA6BQHU/Berman%20-%201999%20-%20Were%20There%20Twelfth-Century%20Cistercian%20Nuns.pdf),” *Church History* 68, no. 4 (December 1999): 824–64. * * * The White Nuns considers Cistercian women and the women who were their patrons in a clear-eyed reading of narrative texts and administrative records. In rejecting long-accepted misogynies and misreadings, Constance Hoffman Berman offers a robust model for historians writing against received traditions. Modern studies of the religious reform movement of the central Middle Ages have often relied on contemporary accounts penned by Cistercian monks, who routinely exaggerated the importance of their own institutions while paying scant attention to the remarkable expansion of abbeys of Cistercian women. Yet by the end of the thirteenth century, Constance Hoffman Berman contends, there were more houses of Cistercian nuns across Europe than of monks. In The White Nuns, she charts the stages in the nuns' gradual acceptance by the abbots of the Cistercian Order's General Chapter and describes the expansion of the nuns' communities and their adaptation to a variety of economic circumstances in France and throughout Europe. While some sought contemplative lives of prayer, the ambition of many of these religious women was to serve the poor, the sick, and the elderly. Focusing in particular on Cistercian nuns' abbeys founded between 1190 and 1250 in the northern French archdiocese of Sens, Berman reveals the frequency with which communities of Cistercian nuns were founded by rich and powerful women, including [Queen Blanche of Castile](https://isidore.co/calibre/#panel=book_details&book_id=8504) [[Maubisson](https://arts.st-andrews.ac.uk/monasticmatrix/monasticon/maubisson) (Cistercian)], heiresses Countess Matilda of Courtenay and Countess Isabelle of Chartres, and esteemed ladies such as Agnes of Cressonessart. She shows how these founders and early patrons assisted early abbesses, nuns, and lay sisters by using written documents to secure rights and create endowments, and it is on the records of their considerable economic achievements that she centers her analysis. The White Nuns considers Cistercian women and the women who were their patrons in a clear-eyed reading of narrative texts in their contexts. It challenges conventional scholarship that accepts the words of medieval monastic writers as literal truth, as if they were written without rhetorical skill, bias, or self-interest. In its identification of long-accepted misogynies, its search for their origins, and its struggle to reject such misreadings, The White Nuns provides a robust model for historians writing against received traditions.

Modern studies of the religious reform movement of the central Middle Ages have often relied on contemporary accounts penned by Cistercian monks, who routinely exaggerated the importance of their own institutions while paying scant attention to the remarkable expansion of abbeys of Cistercian women. Yet by the end of the thirteenth century, Constance Hoffman Berman contends, there were more houses of Cistercian nuns across Europe than of monks. In The White Nuns, she charts the stages in the nuns' gradual acceptance by the abbots of the Cistercian Order's General Chapter and describes the expansion of the nuns' communities and their adaptation to a variety of economic circumstances in France and throughout Europe. While some sought contemplative lives of prayer, the ambition of many of these religious women was to serve the poor, the sick, and the elderly.

Focusing in particular on Cistercian nuns' abbeys founded between 1190 and 1250 in the northern French archdiocese of Sens, Berman reveals the frequency with which communities of Cistercian nuns were founded by rich and powerful women, including Queen Blanche of Castile, heiresses Countess Matilda of Courtenay and Countess Isabelle of Chartres, and esteemed ladies such as Agnes of Cressonessart. She shows how these founders and early patrons assisted early abbesses, nuns, and lay sisters by using written documents to secure rights and create endowments, and it is on the records of their considerable economic achievements that she centers her analysis.

The White Nuns considers Cistercian women and the women who were their patrons in a clear-eyed reading of narrative texts in their contexts. It challenges conventional scholarship that accepts the words of medieval monastic writers as literal truth, as if they were written without rhetorical skill, bias, or self-interest. In its identification of long-accepted misogynies, its search for their origins, and its struggle to reject such misreadings, The White Nuns provides a robust model for historians writing against received traditions.